Dr. Dockery is in.

I wish I could print this tomorrow. But it will be months before we'll get to it.

We've now spent 2 days, both in the office and bathroom, laughing riotously at an endless variety of greeting card options that arrived via post from our Ace in the Hole from Hillsborough, NC.

Today in the shop I got asked the #1 question about our greeting cards again, which is "who the hell writes these?" Yes I write some, and design most, everyone else here has had their glory and/or glories in one way or another, but nobody can do what Tyler does, which is create a brilliantly illogical fucked up and funny situation from seemingly harmless characters.

It's highlighted cuz its a sure winner and
will probably be on the next negative.


The ideas come to us in vast catalogues, usually 10-25 ideas are used from a single session , but I've been known to go back on stuff from years back and have decided the world is now ready for one particular shock or another. I'm glad I've saved it all, for it is endless.


This will be a poster, not a card.

For the first time ever, Tyler has actually written right on the image page (after he found out thats how WE do) --- instead of his standard notepad rants such as this one from our Oz series, in which he will take multiple cracks at a single image:


My favorite of Oz, "That's right Motherfucker!" came off of this page. Another good caption from the list was "Don't worry, it won't be bad- [Scarecrow] put condoms on ALL his fingers."


Here are a few of Farrell's picks from the new material. The last image is what apparently had Sarah in hysterics in the bathroom and she recited it verbatim from memory to me, tho it were lengthy.




I like to imagine the shoe salesman as Christopher Walken.
You'll see what I mean once I get a design together and break up/pace the dialogue.


I think we have 2 or 3 cards we'll make from this group (wanna vote, make a comment), but that doesn't mean we can't post the funny-but-not-for-cards stuff here.

Just in case you missed Tyler's twitter address from the last post.
Just in case you wanted to know what his day job is.

Just in case you are wondering how Tyler and I know each other, we went to art school together, shared some classes, and lived (next door, Tyler?) in the same dorm. We were on the same floor to be sure. That's another blog, which might or might not happen, one of these days.

Today

Thar he blow.

In honor of Tyler Dockery's twitter page I shall here post my day's important minutia in one fell swoop-- and this day we're talking about is from 9 am yesterday till 7am now, so hold on to your seats people, this ain't no 140 character post.


Recent BBH design by Jay Franck.
Met with Jay Franck
Jay has been doing freelance design for us for about a year. I didn't have to twist his arm to come in last minute to save me from a mountain of work.


Listened to the new Decemberists Album
Multiple multiple times. It's called The Hazards of Love. It is a concept album, it is a rock opera, there is a children's choir somewhere in there, and it is streaming free here. (Try out "The Rake's Song") This is by far their finest effort and a giant leap for them as musicians. The album is one big fluid piece-- no pause between tracks- its a mess in my mind but I'm determined to figure it out, and will likely run this one into the ground.



This severely cropped image is all I got of my painting for now.
Paid for a painting of Gus Grissom by Lisa Nance.
I couldn't make it to her opening last Friday, so I stopped in at Harvest Records early to call dibs on the best painting before anyone else could. If there is one thing Lisa and I have that sets us apart from everyone else, it's an unhealthy obsession with Gus Grissom.

Got Carl's reaction to our blog post about him.
He related to me in one brief sentence a lifetime of being a Luke Skywalker look-alike. He also reported that after seeing the blog himself, it had been seen by the rest of Fed-Ex within a matter of hours. He was flurrying out the door as he said this but I'm pretty sure he meant beyond the West Asheville office, as he expects it to be "in the New York Times by Monday." Dude's got a Fed-Ex truck full of empty Red Bull cans!

Realized I have to buy $500 worth of envelopes to fill the Urban Outfitter order
Ouch. More on that one later.

Watched Emily knock out 1500 Solid as Barack cards.
She is emotionally ambivilant for having not come anywhere near the record for most hours standing at the Universal 1. She is also disqualified anyhow for taking breaks to read on a stoop of an abandoned store front.

Coaxed three people, including Fritz Klinke of NA Graphics into saying "Rat's Ass" on the letterpress listserv, without having said it myself.
Some people didn't think it was as funny as I did. But it was after midnight and it happened so quickly. Anything goes!


Finished this wedding suite.
Mostly I coached our apprentice Cera through it but I definitely had my fair share of press time (ending at 5am).

Possibly thwarted car theft again.
They never think that someone would actually be occupying a retail space at 4am.

Opened $8 wine bottle somebody left in the fridge today.
Word.

They say that idle hands are the work of the devil,
but I happened to strike a pretty sweet deal with the guy so it is all good in the neighborhood. I slacked hard this week and made up for it in spades today.

Sweet Dreams ya'll, its movie time.

Use Fed-Ex, Young Skywalker

Carl, our Fed-Ex guy, poses mid-duel on the lower deck
of the Death Star throne room.

The number of packages going out every day has gotten a bit out of hand so we started scheduling regular pickups from Fed-Ex. It's normally Carl who swings by-- who has fast become a bit like family, even if only for a few seconds a day.

Last month he gave us his cell phone number for emergency pickups, but we had a better idea, which was to throw up a sign in the window signaling a need for pickup, as we are on his regular route.

The "Carl Signal" was Farrell's idea, and I have been dying to make it happen for a while now.


This oughta get him outta the Carl Cave.

Today I finally had all the right ingredients for a very brief photo shoot: Light Saber, Digital Camera, & Carl. When I handed him the light saber, he was like, "Who put you up to this?"

Don't pretend like we don't know, Carl.

Collaborating with the Beeherd

An event poster collaboration between David Page and Brandon Mise

David Page of Beeherd Communications contacted me a while back about collaborating on some art-- I really loved his work, unfortunately most stuff I need artwork for is for people who can't afford it, i.e. musicians and art folk (we rarely charge a design fee for local musicians/events) so I felt bad for taking him up on his offer, until he reposted a similar request on the letpress listserv just recently.


A pretty awesome cover for the New Yorker by David Page

BBH got its first gig for a theater production and I immediately thought of David-- he was very generous to devote his time to this project in exchange for prints alone. The poster image for Weldon Rising is the digital design-- we'll post the final product sometime next week.


One of the more interesting color separations I've seen in my days.

The Human Bouncy Ball

A cartoon character my son and I invented that bounces like a super ball while destroying the enemy with gun fire. Click on the image for a better look.

My kid knows Rock

I'm not sure how Toby got wind of Van Halen's 1984, which came out eighteen years before he was born.

My seven year old son Toby recently told me about his favorite album, when I asked for more details, he told me the second track was called "Jump" and that there was a picture of a baby angel smoking a cigarette on the album's cover. I immediately knew he was describing the cover art for 1984, an image that forever burned itself into my virgin (and freshly baptised) eight year old mind one fateful Christmas morning.

Van Halen taught me as a child that it is a totally awesome idea to have sexual relations with your hot grade school teacher.

1984 was the first cassette tape I owned. It was given to me by my Granny one Christmas, and it still remains an all-time favorite.

The album is also noteworthy as David Lee Roth's last romp with the band before they kicked him to the curb, which leads to a brief tooting of the old horn (and this segue was definitely not intended or considered when I started writing this post.)


Just a few months ago, Toby's father letterpressed business cards for Sammy Hagar, who took David Lee Roth's place as lead singer of this legendary rock group.



And just in case you are wondering what Sammy is doing "right now"...

Right now, Brandon is not pleased with the terrible pun, but still loves this video, even if it's just another cheesy feel good faux-philosophical-social-commentary rock ballad from the nineties.

...according to the back of his business card, Sammy owns a cantina in Cabo called Cabo Wabo, makes a blue agave tequila by the same name, owns what now appears to be a chain called Sammy's Beach Bar & Grill (who's profits are donated to various Hawaiian Charities), and dabbles in managing musicians/entertainers.

BBH Top Sellers

At the request of a larger potential client, we were asked to come up with a list of top sellers. Farrell crunched the numbers for "all time" best sellers, best sellers of 2008, and best selling new product of 2009 (we did not relist styles that hit multiple categories.)

Here it goes.

All Time Best Sellers:
1. Once upon a Time
2. Totally
3. I Love My Life With You
4. Cooking With Satan
5. Girls Want Firemen
6. Is This the Lift to Brokeback?
7. Dude, WTF?
8. Good Lord, No Alcohol
9. Alice: Kmart Trash
10. Chopsticks
11. Another Glass of Wine
12. It's a Girl!
13. Left Me for Dead
14. The Nice Daddy
15. Elephant Forget About You
16. Do I Reek of Bourbon?
17. Oh No She Didn't!
18. You Rock
19. Finding Presents
20. Wish You Were Here


2008 Best Sellers
1. Steaming Christmas Surprise
2. Rudolph, Where Are We?
3. You Blew It
4. Elvis Christmas
5. Drinking Alone
6. Holiday Balls
7. Little Wiener
8. Birthday Cart
9. Bless You and Yours, Chief
10. My Biznitch is the Shiznit
11. I had to Bounce, Dog
12. Holla!
13. The Wonders of Viagra
14. Rat Poison/Paprika
15. Iguana Be With You
16. POOF!
17. Pogo Boy Hoppy Birthday
18. Heavy Breathing/Wrong Number
19. Me Have Big Love


The popularity of the Obama cards surprised all of us here,
coming out on top of even our most popular classics.

2009 Best New Product
1. Obama Oath of Office
2. Obama Solid as Barack
3. Obama Fucking Shit is Right!
4. The Parrot's Lament
5. A Coveted Recipe
6. I'd Fuck Me
7. Obama Irie
8. I Wrote That Shit in a Book
9. Palin Can See My Ass
10. Is She Hot Enough?
11. Flaming Success
12. Happy Anniversary Balloon
13. Marriage is Torture
14. Mother!!! Fucking!!! Girl!!! Power!!

Pirate posting VI: Parrot's Lament, Revisited

For the sixth and final design of the Pirate themed wooden postcards, I reconceptualized the Parrot's Lament card as a full color/in-scene card. This would be a pain in the ass to pull off w/ letterpress, though to be sure the reprint of the letterpress version will be more complex than its current incarnation. Half of the work on this one is already credited to Tyler- so we'll split the royalties on this one.

Also went ahead and knocked out the back of the cards, which looks like so:

All that's left is to confer w/ Kristin at Spitfire Girl about logistics. More than likely they'll be ready for the Stationery Show in May. I've been working on this project non-stop for about 30 hours and am sick of it. Off to bed!

Pirate posting V: More Butt Pirates

Can you find 3 diferences between this one...


and the one I posted 45 minutes ago?

Here's the source material, which was difficult to work with. On a roll, one more to go.

Pirate posting part IV: Girl Pirate

This particular one was redrawn from the historical painting below.

Pirate posting part III: Ye Original Butt Pirate